Fats and fat emulsions are used in cakes to impart tenderness, succulence, texture and crumb and promote increase in volume by shortening the strands of gluten and aggregates of starch, which in the absence of fat would form a tough meshwork structure; it therefore assists the leavening in the oven of the cake of non-fermented doughs, where rapid rising by means of gas from baking powder and vapour is required. Fat also acts as a foaming/whipping agent in the aeration process of batters and doughs to achieve the required volume of the baked products.
So far fat blends or emulsions containing about 16-20% water, such as margarines, have been used for producing bakery products, e.g. cakes.
In recent years, a need has arisen for low calorie bakery products and it was proposed to replace part of the fat used for producing them, by water. The amount of water which could be used was, however, limited because the batter becomes weak, aeration becomes a problem, a decrease in cake volume is observed and locally uncooked cakes are obtained.
Some recipes for bakery products, e.g. choux paste, do allow compensation for the amount of water introduced by using emulsions with a high level of water.
Cakes can also be prepared by aerating egg or egg white instead of the fat phase, in which case low fat emulsions can be used for products such as sponge cake.
Applicants have found w/o emulsions with a reduced fat content, which can be used to produce bakery products which do not display the above-mentioned drawbacks.